Editor's Note: The Snooze Button Generation originally published "100 Nonfiction Books I Recommend" in 2019. As we read exceptional books, the list continually updates. Today, "One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This" by Omar El Akkad enters the Social Conscience category.
When we don't speak up, when we don't acknowledge problems or atrocities or even a genocide, aren't we complicit? Didn't that same situation occur in Nazi Germany in the past century? Why are we so complicit, and why do so many bury themselves in their phone with misinformation, or diversions, that are of little importance or value?
One Day, Everyone Will Have Always Been Against This (2025) by Omar El Akkad eloquently calls out United States hypocrisy as well as that of the Democratic Party and Western liberals in regards to the Middle East. I have soaked in many of El Akkad's excellent points and have multiple takeaways. One obvious one is that the war in Palestine is absolutely morally reprehensible, and it's a sad state of affairs when that truism somehow is not commonly accepted among the masses — although it actually, probably is but conveniently kept out of U.S. media.
El Akkad worked for more than a decade as a reporter for The Globe and Mail based in Toronto, and to me, his most impressive reporting was covering the war in Afghanistan. His journalism informed him write his first novel, American War (2017), and that book garnered numerous accolades.
One Day... is nonfiction and mostly memoir. His book can be emotional, as he examines war atrocities, especially ones involving children. However, I find its strength to be its non-apologetic logic, and simple reporting, of what is happening in Palestine.
I'd argue that the vast majority of Americans are tired of misinformation, echo chambers and unnecessary wars. The era of misinformation has become so widespread that overly biased, wrong info has even crept into reputable publications. El Akkad points out that The Guardian described the Israeli military opening fire on civilians wanting flour as "food aid-related deaths."
El Akkad also points out: "As with many events in the war between Israel and Hamas," The Economist reports, "the facts are destined to remain fiercely contested."
It is destiny for facts to be fiercely contested, El Akkad repeats. No, no, that cannot be an accepted truth of this war.
One fact I found is that only 16 percent of Americans say Israel's military has the right approach to its war, according to the Pew Research Center. An AP-NORC poll says that 50 percent of Americans say Israel has gone too far in the war. I wholeheartedly believe that number would be much, much higher if more Americans knew the actual facts of what is happening.
Right now, the casualty count is approximately 74,500 Palestinians to 2,000 Israelis. In the Oct. 7 attacks on Israel, 1,195 people were killed. Furthermore, in the 74,5000 Palestinian deaths, the majority are civilian. The United Nations estimates that about 21,500 of those deaths are children. Repeat: 21,500 of those deaths are children.
El Akkad explains that on Jan. 26, 2024, the International Court of Justice ruled that Israel needed to stand trial for genocide. However, the United States, Canada, United Kingdom and six other nations then cut all funding to the United Nations Relief and Works Agency, one of only a few organizations that was providing relief to Palestine. Subsequently, the ICJ basically did nothing.
Later, on Oct. 10, 2024, a UN Commission found war crimes and crimes against humanity in Israeli attacks on Gaza health facilities and the treatment of detainees and hostages. Israel deliberately targeted health-care facilities, and children bore the brunt of the destruction.
Regardless, the U.S. continued to support, and fund, Israel. I don't know how this doesn't sicken Americans, and I don't know why Hind Rajab isn't a household name.
El Akkad's book pinpoints U.S. hypocrisy so well that I believe it may be in the fabric of what this country actually is. He writes: "A central privilege of being of this place becomes the ability to hold two contradictory thoughts simultaneously. The first being the belief that one's nation behaves in keeping with the scrappy righteousness of the underdog. The second being an unspoken understanding that, in reality, the most powerful nation in human history is no underdog, cannot possibly be one, but at least the immense violence implicit in the contradiction will always be inflicted on someone else."
We pretend we're Luke Skywalker, but, hello, we are globally Darth Vader and the Evil Empire.
For anybody who is pro-Israel, that is fine. But I believe someone can be pro-Israel and against this genocide. In fact, I find pro-Israel protesters of this war to be the most inspiring protesters out there. We have many organizations out there, including Standing Together, Americans for Peace Now and Partners for a Progressive Israel, that promote such a stance.
El Akkad was born in Cairo, but moved to Montreal as a teenager. He is a U.S. citizen and lives in the Portland, Ore., area.
I wholeheartedly believe that one strength of being American is the ability to question, and refute, incorrect policies promoted by elected officials. It's not about blind pretend loyalty, especially when elected officials don't hold up their obvious duty — to act on the best interests of their constituents.
By eloquently pointing out putrid U.S. policy and by articulating what life is like for a Muslim American in a post-9/11 world, El Akkad is what an American hero actually is.
When I asked Sophie if she had any hobbies, she answered, "Urban hiking."
After Dina an I spent Labor Day Weekend with her and Chloe, we all partook in the ole pastime of urban hiking and had a blast. Is there any better way to truly see a city than to hit the streets and walk?
We devoted two full days to hitting the streets of San Francisco. We had dabbled in S.F. the past few years and did some cool stuff with visits to SFMOMA and Chinatown leading the charge. However, this past visit, we took our adventuring to the next level by hitting up various parts of town and constantly walking and doing some touristy hipster stuff.
Sophie is quite the adventurer. She sees EDM shows throughout the Bay Area and doesn't bat an eye with traveling to San Jose or Palo Alto. She's a public transportation aficionado, and when Dina and I visited, we had a car. We had wild accessibility to S.F.
Any good traveler likely realizes that the best way to see a city is on foot. It's good to know my daughters already are good travelers as they have an entire world to see.
Before I go any further, I must reiterate "I'm an East Bay guy." Cousin Clyde grew up in downtown Oakland, and I find the vibe in the East Bay much chiller and less tech-bro heavy than other parts of the Bay. Plus, the weather is better in the East Bay. Also, let me point out that Chloe is an adventurer as well, but Sophie truly, truly explores with urban hiking.
In the summer of '94, before my senior year in college, I spent a week in S.F. More than 30 years later, it's interesting to see how the city has changed. It's richer, more gentrified. It's idyllic in certain parts and oozes charm. It's kind of the opposite of some parts of downtown L.A. that are overrun by homeless and feel like a dystopia.
Back in '94, the attitude I had was "aw, man, San Francisco really sold out. What happened to the peace, love and hippies?" The funny thing is that premise was a myth and ridiculous from the onset. I wish I had read Joan Didion's Slouching Toward Bethlehembefore then because I might have seen the truth of Haight-Ashbury and the reality of the so-called hippie movement.
Nonetheless, walking around Haight-Ashbury probably was my favorite part of urban hiking. Sophie loved it too. Shockingly, she said, "I've never been here. I didn't even know it existed. I'll be coming back. For sure."
Perhaps we Stevenses have an affinity for countercultures — or at least Sophie and I do. But Chloe pointed out that maybe I just loved the Haight-Ashbury experience so much because a passer-by overheard a joke of mine and laughed hysterically at: "Oh thank god, finally, a smoke shop!"
The original Ben & Jerry's stands on the corner of Haight and Ashbury, and it was fitting that the district's stretch now ends with a Whole Foods. What could possibly signal gentrification more than that? While Didion wrote that teenage runaways and drug addicts filled Haight-Ashbury in the '60s, now I say it's riddled with trust-fund yoga instructors.
Sophie suggested visiting Twin Peaks, and with her recommendation, we drove up to Christmas Tree Point and witnessed a breathtaking view that gave me chills. Wow! The wind pelted us so hard up there that I felt a silly moment of fright. What if we were blown off of Christmas Tree Point and into the mar?
With Chloe living in her first apartment as a sophomore and Sophie a senior, I feel I'm in a good spot with these two Cal gals. I feel close with them but am trying to give them proper space to explore and be themselves. A whole world is out there to explore, and you can't go wrong with urban hiking.
I believe my uncle and my cousin, the World's Most Dependable and/or the World's Most Sophisticated Man, every so often have done mega-walks through the streets of Cleveland. Chloe has a plan for her and me to start a walk in Newport Beach and end in Long Beach.
When I lived in New York City for three years, I hit the streets on foot constantly throughout Manhattan and even Brooklyn and Queens. Perhaps there's a reason why I was mesmerized by the 2018 documentary The World Before Your Feet about a guy who walks every square foot of New York City.
We Stevenses want to get out there and explore. You really can only do that on foot.
